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Barbara Korte. Body Language in Literature. Toronto and Buffalo: University of Toronto Press,
1997. vii + 329 pp. $22.95 (paper), ISBN 978-0-8020-7656-4; $61.00 (cloth), ISBN 978-0-80200706-3.
Reviewed by Kate Anderson (University of Wisconsin-Madison)
Published on H-LIS (January, 1999)
A nod. A touch. A folding of hands. Barbara Korte argues that, in narrative literature, references to body language are never just throwaway lines. Instead, these instances of nonverbal communication create a body semiotics, an “important signifying system in the literary text”
that “contributes to the text’s potential significance and
effect” (p. 4). Based on a reader’s everyday competence
to interpret nonverbal communication as well as an acquired literary one, the interpretation of a text’s body
language gives the reader a useful tool to read, or misread, the individual characters and the interactions between characters. In Body Language in Literature, Barbara Korte systematically brings nonverbal communication to the fore, adding a new type of language to the
study of the body in literary criticism.
to Margaret Atwood’s 1985 The Handmaid’s Tale. Careful
to emphasize that her work is based on a highly selective
sample, Korte rightly makes no claims to completeness
or statistical reliability but instead emphasizes her desire
to set up a critical framework for an analysis of body language that could be applied to any narrative text. After
the introductory section, Part II sets up the critical framework, and Part III gives an historical overview of body
language in the novel of the British Isles from the sixteenth century to the present. Korte also provides three
useful bibliographies: one for the primary sources she
has used; one for secondary sources on body language in
literature, theatre, film, and art; and one for secondary
sources on nonverbal-communication research.
Much of Part II consists of defining the terms of nonverbal communication and giving examples from literary
texts. Korte divides nonverbal communication into two
classifications: modal and functional. The modes or types
of body language consist of Kinesics (body movements,
particularly facial expression and eye behavior); Haptics
(touch); and Proxemics (spatial orientation). The function of the body language consists of emotional displays
and externalizers, regulators and illustrators, and emblems. For example, a “stooping carriage” is a body posture (kinesic) that can, depending on the literary context,
function as an emotional display of mourning (p. 63).
Thus, Korte argues, each instance of body language can
be coded for what it is and what it does. Korte plots the
body language of a text onto a “Modal-Functional Classification System,” a chart with the modal classifications
down the side and the functional classifications across
the top. She counts the instances of body language, codes
them, and fills in the boxes. From this painstaking approach, Korte can give a general profile of what types of
This language comes from the fields of expression
psychology, social psychology, and sociology. Korte,
Professor of English literature at the University of Tubingen in Germany, expands the more traditional literary
focus on “gesture” or “posture” in order to incorporate
the terminology of nonverbal communication, a field of
psychological research coming out of the early sixties.
Unlike the field of physiognomy that studies permanent
features, the field of nonverbal communication studies
the body in motion. (Korte uses “body language,” “nonverbal communication,” and “nonverbal behavior” interchangeably.) Originally published in Germany in 1993
as Korpersprache in der Literatur: Theorie und Geschichte
am Beispiel englischer Erzahlprosa, Korte’s work focuses
mainly on English and North American literature, literature heavily influenced by European culture. The texts
range from John Bunyan’s 1678 Pilgrim’s Progress to W.
Somerset Maugham’s 1944 The Razor’s Edge, from Geoffrey Chaucer’s fourteenth century The Canterbury Tales
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body language are used for what purposes. The drawback
to this method, of course, is the rigidity of the chart. Because Korte assumes that nonverbal communication “always plays a particular role within the situation in which
it occurs and can thus be assigned to a particular functional class” (p. 36), her readings–at times, forced–often
leave little or no room for ambiguity.
the text.
When Korte turns to the historical perspective at the
end of her work, Body Language in Literature comes alive.
In Part III, Korte concentrates on the historical development of body language in the novels of the British Isles
from the sixteenth century to the present. While her
sample size of eighty novels is admittedly too small and
After defining her terms, Korte turns to the literary the bulk of her texts really represent eighteenth century
texts. Korte is most successful when her readings of the to the present, she reasonably argues that “body language
nonverbal communication contribute to a larger read- is increasingly gaining ground in the aesthetic of the Ening of the text. Her readings of Laurence Sterne and glish novel” (p. 178). In the post-Richardson novel, “EvMargaret Atwood are particularly good, adding new lay- eryday life gains significance as material for the novel;
ers of perspective to the vast criticism on these authors. the concreteness and credibility of the world portrayed
Here, Korte’s interdisciplinary approach of using exist- become important principles” (p. 184). She emphasizes a
ing terminology in a new field is note worthy and use- growing “attention to detail” that creates a need for novful. Korte is least successful when she moves from one els to be “particular” (p. 187). Part of this need for the
quick example of body language to the next without con- particular stems from the rise of photography and, in the
nections between texts or across literary time periods. twentieth century, motion pictures as new ways of seeWhile she herself argues that we must know the cul- ing the body. In Part III, Korte nicely supplements her
tural specifics before assigning a particular meaning to close readings with evidence from painting and other via particular gesture, her own examples tend to dehis- sual arts, giving her readings a forcefulness that is often
toricize her texts. In one such case of literary whiplash, lacking in Part II.
Korte moves from William Golding’s 1955 The Inheritors
In Body Language in Literature, Barbara Korte does
to Anita Brookner’s 1987 A Friend from England to J.D.
set
up
an interesting framework for bringing the termiSalinger’s 1950 “For Esme–with Love and Squalor” to
nology of expression psychology into the realm of literSamuel Richardson’s 1747-49 Clarissa all in the space of
ary criticism. I do, however, hope that she pushes her
a page and a half (pp. 143-44). Unfortunately, Korte does
not stop to analyze why the body language is important own analysis and follows up with “further research” she
in these texts or how the cues differ across the centuries; suggests at the end of this work. A systematic study of
she only states that the body language is there. Too often, gender or a systematic look at etiquette books (something
Korte’s readings become laundry lists of here body lan- Karen Halttunen has done very well for American literature in Confidence Men and Painted Women: A Study of
guage, there body language, everywhere body language.
Middle-Class Culture in America, 1830-1870) or a systemWhile Part II can be slow going (especially for those atic look at body language medical writings would be the
of us unfamiliar with expression psychology), it does end needed touch to make Korte’s work truly stand out.
with a particularly useful section entitled “Body LanCopyright (c) 1999 by H-Net, all rights reserved. This
guage in the Narrative Text: An Open Catalogue of Queswork
may be copied for non-profit educational use if
tions” (pp. 172-73). The questions clearly summarize
proper
credit is given to the author and the list. For other
Korte’s main points, reminding us to ask what the frepermission, please contact [email protected].
quency, context, and role of the body language are within
If there is additional discussion of this review, you may access it through the network, at:
http://www.h-net.msu.edu/~lis
Citation: Kate Anderson. Review of Korte, Barbara, Body Language in Literature. H-LIS, H-Net Reviews. January,
1999.
URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=2714
Copyright © 1999 by H-Net, all rights reserved. H-Net permits the redistribution and reprinting of this work for
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